Of Fear In Gilded Cages
by Imriel
Summary: DH prologue, as seen through Draco's eyes. "Draco didn’t know anymore, couldn’t think, so thick was the fear in his mouth, in his mind, and he stared at the body overhead, and it was so easy to see himself hanging there."


Draco Malfoy sat in his room on his vast bed, staring numbly at the ornate silver and green bedspread. The place he used to regard as his safe haven, the place of his childhood, his _home_—was desecrated. The gilded panels, rich tapestries, sparkling chandeliers—all examples of the Manor's opulence and grandeur, seemed duller, tarnished. The Dark Lord's presence in his home had cast an incontrovertible shadow on both the building and its occupants. They lived day to day, knowing that avoiding the Dark Lord's displeasure was to walk a very thin line. The Dark Lord's tolerance of the Malfoy family was tenuous.

Any moment now Draco should be heading down to the drawing room for the meeting. He could taste the fear in his mouth, a metallic bite that made his stomach queasy and his throat tight.

His neck arched as slate gray eyes hopelessly sough for reassurance and strength in the enchanted stars in his ceiling. He remembered when he had begged his father to enchant the ceiling to be just like the stories he had told him of Hogwarts. Of course, Hogwarts wasn't an exactly reassuring train of thought anymore, was it? No—not with the memory of his failure fresh and irrevocable in his mind.

"Am I so weak?" Draco whispered as he buried his face in his hands, his whole body trembling.

A knock on the door startled him, nearly causing him to fall off the bed. Hastily arranging his features into a mask of bored indifference, he called out in a voice that only faltered a little, "C-come in."

The pale but lovely face of his mother peered at him when the door opened. Draco began to relax, his shoulder's slumping slightly, when he caught a view of the hulking shadow behind his mother.

"My darling," she said quietly, "the meeting is about to begin." Her eyes begged him to be silent, and she made a slight gesture with her left hand. Draco caught his breath slightly before nodding.

"I will be down in just a moment, thank you Mother," he said coolly. The door shut as his mother retreated.

_The Dark Lord was to be there tonight._ That was the message his mother had communicated with her signal. Draco tried to keep his breathing slow, tired to stop his heart from beating so fast in his chest—pointless, impossible. He stood slowly, striding across the room, stopping abruptly to stare at his appearance in the silver mirror hanging on the wall. The face, white from fear, which stared back at him shouldn't belong to a Malfoy. Which a shaking hand—_I must _stop_ that!_—he swept back his white-blond hair, and _forced_ himself to look like someone who was about to go into the presence of his beloved master, instead of someone who could feel death around the corner every time the Dark Lord was there. All it would take was one look in his eyes… and all would be lost.

ooo

Walking down the staircase, his hand tightly grasping the banister, Draco could already hear the voices in the drawing room. The portraits on the wall of Malfoy ancestors stared gravely down at him, nodding solemnly as he passed. He crossed the welcome-hallway, his footsteps muffled by the thick carpet and quickly composed himself before pushing the doors open and striding into the room with an air of feigned confidence. However, his act was spoiled as he stumbled holding back a cry at the unconscious woman hanging upside-down and rotating over the table.

His eyes scanned frantically for his parents now that his pretense was broken, and he saw them both staring at him intently, his father jerking his head slightly, drawing Draco's attention to the empty chair next to them. Walking clumsily to the table, unable to regain his poise, the presence of the hanging woman screaming at him and he had to force himself to stumble into the seat. Draco noticed as more Death Eaters entered room and took their places, that all only gave the rotating figure a cursory glance before ignoring it, while his own eyes kept being drawn to it again and again.

And then, _he _was there.

The Dark Lord strode into the room, his black robes flourishing around him as his wand hand flicked and a high-backed chair was conjured in front of the fireplace. He sat down in it with the air of someone who was master of his surroundings. And, Draco thought, looking at the sallow skinned shadow of his father. His father had returned from Azkaban broken, the instinctual aristocracy he'd always exhibited gone, reduced to a thin replica of the man Draco had idolized, broken in service to the Dark Lord, sweat now beading his sunken face.

_And for what have we been reduced to this_, he thought bitterly. _The Dark Lord has won, but what place does my family have in this new order? We constantly fear for our lives, our service discounted, our nobility discarded, our home defiled. _

All of a sudden, the wooden doors to the drawing room swung open, and the formidable figure of Professor Snape walked in, accompanied by another familiar man. Draco glanced once more at the body rotating right above him.

"Yaxley. Snape," said the high clear voice of the Dark Lord from his seat at the head of the table. "You are very nearly late.

"Severus, here," the Dark Lord gestured at the seat to his right. "Yaxley, beside Dolohov."

Draco couldn't help but stare at the man for years he had thought a mentor, who for years had held a place in his regard second only to his mother and father. The man who had urged for his confidence all last year, who he had thought in his time of greatest weakness last year _might_ have been able to help him. Instead, he thought, eyes narrowing, Snape had been after glory for himself. Snape was now the most exalted of Death Eaters, the most highly trusted for his services to the Dark Lord.

_Even though it was I who made it all possible, I who disarmed Dumbledore, who found a way to let Death Eaters into an impregnable school_, Draco thought fervently, while another traitorous thought whispered to him. _But you couldn't do it, could you. You couldn't kill him, even when he was helpless and at your mercy. And if the others hadn't caught up just then, when you were just about to—_

His attention was drawn to the front of the room as the Dark Lord spoke again.

"So?"

"My Lord, the Order of the Phoenix intends to move Harry Potter—" Draco glanced sharply at Snape at the name of the one he loathed more than any other, "from his current place of safety on Saturday next, at nightfall."

Draco could see that Snape now had the undivided attention of everyone at the table. They all knew that the Dark Lord's first priority was capturing Potter.

"Saturday…at nightfall," the Dark Lord was repeating. The Dark Lord looked at Snape intensely, and Draco knew that he was using Legilimancy on him, probing his mind for the truth.

"Good, very good. And this information comes—"

"—From the source we discussed," said Snape.

Draco noticed a movement from the corner of his eye, and winced as Yaxley leaned forward to speak.

"My Lord, I have heard differently," he paused. "Dawlish, the Auror, let slip that Potter will not be moved until the thirtieth, the night before the boy turns seventeen."

Draco half hoped that Yaxley would be punished for his disruption, in order for the reprieve it might give his own family, but also was frightened of the thought of an incensed Lord. Looking at the smile on Snape's face as Yaxley continued, he wondered why Yaxley even bothered anymore. Hungry for power he might be, but one didn't contradict the Dark Lord's most trusted Death Eater.

"My source tells me that there are plans to lay a false trail; this must be it. No doubt a Confundus Charm has been placed upon Dawlish. It would not be the first time; he is known to be susceptible." Snape drawled quietly.

"I assure you my Lord, Dawlish seemed quite certain," Yaxley persisted.

"If he has been Confunded, naturally he is certain. I assure _you_ Yaxley, the Auror Office will play no further part in the protection of Harry Potter. The Order believes that we have infiltrated the Ministry."

Draco started as a man not far from Yaxley started giggling, and cursed himself.

"The Order's got one thing right, then, eh?"

The Dark Lord was paying none of them attention. Yet still Yaxley spoke, and Draco couldn't believe his audacity.

"My Lord, Dawlish believes an entire party of Aurors will be used to transfer the boy—" he stopped speaking as the Dark Lord held up a hand. He spoke to Snape as if no one else had been speaking.

"Where are they going to hide the boy next?"

"At the home of one of the Order. The place, according to the source, has been given every protection that the Order and Ministry together could provide," Snape replied. "I think that there is little chance of taking him once he is there, my Lord, unless, of course, the Ministry has fallen before next Saturday, which might give us the opportunity to discover and undo enough of the enchantments to break through the rest."

"Well, Yaxley?" Voldemort spoke to Yaxley finally. "_Will_ the Ministry have fallen by next Saturday?"

Draco watched as Yaxley straightened and spoke, not mentioning his protests against Snape anymore. _Finally_.

"My Lord, I have good news on that score. I have," he paused importantly. "succeeded in placing an Imperius Curse upon Pius Thicknesse."

Draco's eyes widened in surprise. The Dark Lord was further along in him dominance than he had expected. Others were impressed by Yaxley's announcement as well, muttering to each other. The Dark Lord silenced them with another wave of his hand. "It is a start," he announced. "But Thicknesse is only one man. Scrimgeour must be surrounded by our people before I act. One failed attempt on the Minister's life will set me back a long way."

He had no part in plans on the Ministry. None of the Malfoys were privileged to the formulation of the Dark Lord's plans. Draco gazed at the playing flames in the fireplace, thinking of nothing and everything. Then something caught his attention. _Potter_.

"I have been careless, and so have been thwarted by luck and chance, those wreckers of all but the best-laid plans." The Dark Lord let his gaze sweep the assembled Death Eaters. "But I know better now. I understand those things that I did not understand before. I must be the one to kill Harry Potter, and I shall be."

Draco was among the few that didn't look around anxiously when the wail started from below. He knew there were prisoners in the cellar.

"Wormtail," the Dark Lord said quietly, his tone distant. "Have I not told you about keeping our prisoner quiet?"

Wormtail whimpered and scampered out of the room like the rodent he could transform into.

"As I was saying," the Dark Lord looked at his followers. "I understand better now. I shall need, for instance to borrow a wand from one of you before I go to kill Potter."

Draco tried to keep his jaw from dropping in shock and only partly succeeded; the astonishment plain on his face. His hand tightened automatically on his own hawthorn wand, the smooth wood so familiar in his hand, an extension of himself.

"No volunteers?" the Dark Lord whispered. "Let's see… Lucius, I see no reason for you to have a wand anymore."

_NO!_ Draco couldn't believe his ears. _Surely not! _ He stared in horror as his father looked up at his master.

"My Lord?" Father's voice was no longer smooth and cultured, but hoarse, unrecognizable.

"Your wand, Lucius. I require your wand."

"I…" Draco tried furiously not to look at anyone as Father tried to comprehend this newest request. He stared at the table, studying the way the grain changed, counted the lines. For if he looked up now, if the Dark Lord could look into his mind right now, he would be dead. He saw Mother clasp Father's wrist briefly, and Lucius drew out his wand and passed it to the waiting hand.

"What is it?"

_Elm._"Elm, my Lord," his father whispered.

"And the core?"

"Dragon—" Draco's heart cramped at hearing his father's voice falter such._How could the Dark Lord ask such a thing?_ "Dragon heartstring."

"Good," The Dark Lord replied, withdrawing his own wand. Lucius moved slightly, Draco's stomach was in his throat. _Oh no._

"Give you my wand, Lucius? _My_ wand?"

_Don't laugh you bastards! The others were _enjoying_their humiliation, people who had positively fawned over them not a year ago!_

"I have given you your liberty, Lucius, is that not enough for you? But I have noticed that you and your family seem less than happy of late… What is it about my presence in your home that displeases you, Lucius?"

_Oh shit! Fuck! _Draco had never been more terrified in his life, not on top of tower, not during the school year when he thought he might be killed. He could_taste_ their death on the air, hanging as weightily as the Dark Lord's question.

"Nothing—nothing, my Lord!" Lucius was protesting. _Oh Merlin please._

"Such_lies_, Lucius…" And then a sibilant noise, the rasping of scales on stone, and the Dark Lord's huge snake was draping itself around the Dark Lord's shoulders, his hand stroking it while staring at them.

"Why do the Malfoys look to unhappy with their lot? Is my return, my rise to power, not the very thing they professed to desire for so many years?"

_Oh it had been, it had been. But how could I have known, have ever_dreamed_ that life would be like this, not when we were one of the most ancient families, blood purer than most. Aren't we the _image_ of this war, the _reason_ that it was being fought? _Draco didn't know anymore, couldn't think, so thick was the fear in his mouth, in his mind, and he stared at the body overhead, and it was so easy to see _himself_hanging there.

"Of course, my Lord," he could faintly hear his father replying, as if from far away. "We did desire it—we do."

Narcissa nodded, staring straight ahead, not looking at anyone. Draco tore his eyes from the hanging woman, and glanced up at the Dark Lord and the snake, remembering immediately at the glimpse of malicious red eyes to look away.

His aunt was speaking, her voice passionate, voicing the _honor_ at hosting the Dark Lord, their _pleasure_.

_There's no way out. There's nothing we can do. Potter's side will lose, they had all but lost already, yet there was no hope for them on this side, there was only death for anything they chose, oh shit shit shit was nothing to _do!

"What say you, Draco?" The Dark Lord addressed him. _Fuck._ "Will you babysit the cubs?"

Everyone was laughing and jeering. Draco looked terror at his father, the coppery taste of blood flooding his mouth as he chewed a hole in his cheek. His father wouldn't look at him, he was staring at his lap. He turned to Mother in panic, and saw her shake her head slightly, still staring at the wall.

"Enough," the Dark Lord said. Draco thought he could faint from relief. "Enough."

The hall went quiet, waiting for the imminent pronouncement.

"Many of our oldest family trees become a little diseased over time. You must prune yours, must you not, to keep it healthy? Cut away those parts that threaten the health of the rest."

_He's talking about Aunt Andromeda and his cousin. Not us. Not us. _He repeated this to himself.

Bellatrix was answering fervently. "At the first chance!"

"You shall have it. And in your family, so in the world… we will cut away the canker that infects us until only those of the true blood remain…" The Dark Lord raised his father's wand awakened the woman hanging above him.

"Do you recognize our guest, Severus?"

The woman was scared witless, pleading to Snape for help.

"Ah, yes." Snape drawled.

"And you, Draco?" Draco started again at the sound of his name leaving the Dark Lord's lips. He shook his head fervently. _Stop looking at me stop looking at me._ He couldn't look at the rotating woman, it was crude, it was horrendous; would the Dark Lord do it to them when they displeased him yet again? There were no certainties anymore, no protection in his ancestry. They were just as open, just as defenseless against the horrors as anyone else.

"But you would not of taken her classes," the Dark Lord was saying. _A teacher?! _"For those of you who do not know, we are joined here tonight by Charity Burbage, who, until recently, taught at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry." _It's all my fault. I'm the one who made Hogwarts unsafe. But I had no choice, my family, he'd kill us…_

"Yes…Professor Burbage taught the children of witches and wizards all about Muggles… how they are not so different from us…"

Professor Burbage was pleading with Snape again. Didn't she _know_? How could she not know that Snape was a Death Eater, that he would never have helped her?

"Severus…please…please…"

"Silence," Professor Burbage fell silent as Lucius' wand twitched. "Not content with corrupting and polluting the minds of Wizarding children, last week Professor Burbage wrote an impassioned defense of Mudbloods in the _Daily Prophet_. Wizards, she says, must accept these thieves of their knowledge and magic. The dwindling of the purebloods, says Professor Burbage, a most desirable circumstance…She would have us all mate with Muggles…or, no doubt, werewolves…"

_What about Fenrir Grayback? Do the werewolves that fight for the Dark Lord know that he speaks of them as lower than Muggles? What does he say of the purebloods to them?_

"_Avada Kedavra_."

The green flash was bright and sudden. The woman fell to the table in front of him with a crash, and Draco fell out of his chair, landing hard on the floor, staring at the dead witch in horror. He choked back bile at the Dark Lord's final offhand comment.

"Dinner, Nagini."

He fled the hall as slowly and dignified as he could, trying to mask the stiffness as he walked, while every muscle in him was screaming at him to run, that this wasn't self-preservation, this was idiocy, why was he there, he was a Slytherin! This was fear, real and debilitating if he let it conquer him.

_I have no choice._


End file.
